


the wolf of Storm's End

by charleybradburies



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Animals, Background Relationships, Based on a Tumblr Post, Blacksmithing, Childbirth, Drabble, F/M, Gen, I Don't Even Know, I Was Drunk When I Wrote This, Implied Relationships, Mates, Open to Interpretation, POV Arya Stark, POV Gendry, Past Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Pining, Post-Canon, Pregnancy, Protectiveness, Sibling Love, Siblings, Storm's End (ASoIaF), Unplanned Pregnancy, Warg Arya Stark, Warging, Wargs, Wolves
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-04-07 12:42:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19085275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charleybradburies/pseuds/charleybradburies
Summary: In the South, Nymeria takes up residence in a new castle.In the far North, the pack grows.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Begins a few months post-canon.

Nearly the entire castle seems soggy, he thinks, on the first day he's assured he'll finally get to spend some hours in the forge. It was not to the castellan's pleasure that Gendry would rather not constantly wear power, but he was the lord that Storm's End had, and that would need to do. He sets to work on the projects he'd had tabled for weeks, and among the heat and noise he's content for a few hours. 

Until Maester Jurne comes to fetch him, the lord's title on his lips and a look of terror on his face. 

"There's a ruckus at the gates; Ser Davos says you should be brought immediately," he says, sparing him details. If it weren't for the mention of Davos, Gendry would more easily have sent the man away, but of course he cannot, so he grumbles and sets his work down, and heads to the gates. There are guards atop the outer walls, and they call for the gates to open as he approaches, even with their bows drawn towards whatever lies outside. 

He doesn't see Davos until the gates are pushed open, and though he'd known already Davos would not be alone, Gendry is still surprised to see his company, for Davos stands by a wolf. 

A direwolf, to be precise, it must be, as the creature is almost as tall as the man, certainly about the height of a horse. It's bearing its teeth, but at the sight of Gendry, Davos puts his hand out closer to them, though remarking that he "has few enough fingers already."

Gendry doesn't stifle a chuckle at that, but walks carefully towards the two of them. The wolf meets his eyes as they sniff Davos' hand, and for a moment Gendry's struck with fear, his muddy boots stuck in place. Behind him, the guards yell for their like to be at the ready, and then the wolf licks the leather of Davos' glove, the red tongue clear even with the rain falling around them. Davos looks back and meets Gendry's eyes, and then raises the hand to confirm that he's not been hurt.

The wolf keeps their eyes on Gendry, though, and once his own return to them, he knows who they must be.

"Nymeria?" he calls, his voice gentle enough that it surprises him. "Hello." 

He puts out his own hand, and she licks it even with the soot on it, and then whines. 

"She's not here. I'm sorry," he says, only partly unsure why he's apologizing to a wolf he's not entirely sure can understand his words. But she looks around his shoulder at the gate, and sits herself down on her haunches. He's seen Ghost sit before, but wouldn't have expected it from a wilder wolf. 

"At ease," Davos shouts up towards the guards, his voice full of amusement, barely even tinged with worry. 

Nymeria had never been the best behaved of the direwolves, he knows - ever like her namesake, ever like her mistress, ever like his love - but she had come to him, and he had no intention of sending her away. She and Arya were bound, and as such, no matter where Arya was, that bound Gendry to Nymeria, too. 

If she stayed by his side or Davos', surely that would be all right. The people of Winterfell and the Winter Town had lived with the wolves and even the dragons. She needn't be tame, but as long as she hurt no one, he could keep her, couldn't he? There was no one who could order him not to do so, after all. He answered to Bran, now, not to some high lord. 

High lord that wasn't him, that is. It's a role that still doesn't really feel like it fits, but he wears it.

Nymeria doesn't like much of true castle life any more than he does, that much quickly becomes clear. She's a loyal guard for him, though, and likes the luxuries of blankets and hand-feeding. Davos muses that she knew that Arya had chosen him as a "mate" and is somewhat playing her human's part, which in a way is a sad thought, but it's also one that brings light to their lives. She is indeed so much like Arya - gentle and fierce, a skilled hunter and a warm beauty, kind to children and wary of grown men. 

And of grown women, too, soon enough, in ways that are so clearly _Arya_ of her.

Maids and serving girls she allows around him with warnings, but any lesser lady who wishes the (supposedly unattached) Gendry to court her finds the wolf's teeth bared at her in growls. He and Davos draw her back on those occasions, but he can't say he's unappreciative of the fear that it stokes. He only spends a couple more months getting offers for lady's hands before they die down, and when Sansa eventually writes of the wolf he knows the word has spread that far.

One day, Maester Jurne tells him, with a tone of warning, that he shan't expect to find a wife whilst "the beast" is at his heels. Nymeria growls at him in discontent, and Gendry shrugs, his hand stroking the fur upon her head, and says, "so be it."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Y'all asked, so y'all shall receive. 
> 
> Please continue sharing your thoughts!!!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: this chapter is happening somewhat concurrently with the first, just in Arya's POV.

_Jon would want her, even if no one else did.  
_

Arya's thought it half a hundred times in her life, yet she's never needed it to be true more desperately than as she paces the deck at her approach to what remains of Eastwatch. She'd been so silly, to think she could outrun her life. She'd even believed for a time, that she could run off and only return when she felt ready, as though she would someday. And of course, life itself disagreed. 

She supposed it was poetic, that she would have killed the bringer of unprecendented death whilst a new life took root within her, but it didn't make her ready. It would sound like a song to Sansa, but the waves that crashed inside Arya's belly could not feel less like a song if they'd tried, save for a few moments when it had seemed to soak in - that she and Gendry had made a _child_. A human, soon to greet the world, building itself inside her body as she sailed the seas. It was strange to want them in her arms, and yet felt right, and when one of her crewmen had bravely brought up to her how a past lover of his had taken precautions against having to bear a babe, she'd decided to sail for home instead.

Well, not quite _home_. She knew just enough of how Sansa would react to know she didn't want to handle her sister just yet, and as genuine as she wants to wholeheartedly believe Gendry had been in his proposal, she knows she's changed everything in the interim, and she has no desire to land at Storm's End with a round belly and be taken in out of duty. (Bran, of course, was barely Bran most days, and little comfort.) So, she chose to sail for Jon, to land at Eastwatch and write to Castle Black, and incorporate herself and perhaps this child into her brother's life as best she can. 

Jon does want her, of course, so dearly that he's already answered a letter from Bran with his presence at Eastwatch to greet her, full of both happiness and shock, for Bran hadn't written of the babe, only that Arya sailed for that edge of the Wall. It's a surprisingly difficult matter to explain, as he hadn't even known she'd known Gendry, but even with Tormund's jests they manage the conversation. Tormund believes they have more than enough time to make it to the home of his eldest daughter Kyra in time for her to help Arya with the birth, and so they set off into the far North, the three of them on horseback with the loyal Ghost alongside them.

It's after their arrival that Arya has a wolf dream again, an intimate surprise that hasn't greeted her for years. She's Nymeria again, running around a forest she doesn't recognize, rain coming down all around her as she hunts, scents both familiar and unknown finding their ways into her nostrils and her dry mouth. Arya wakes startled, the taste of soot on her tongue. 

The dreams come back in spurts that she can't control, varying greatly in their vividness and their content. With their proximity, Jon has managed to make the best of his time inside Ghost, and of course Bran has great warging talent far beyond the likes of the rest of them, but Arya can't force Nymeria to let her in any more than she herself can be forced. Sometimes, though, simply hoping for the wolf dreams is enough, and she holds onto that as tightly as she can.

She's in the middle of another hunt when she wakes for the birth, full of pain and fear and more pain and some unknown man's voice in her head, words she can't even remember, though she can recall the sight of a fire before Nymeria - or perhaps it was the one in Kyra's little house, the one warming her as she obeys the other woman and _pushes_. By the time it's all over, her feelings are more mixed than before; exhausted, she feels she's danced far too close to Death again, and yet she gladly would for this precious little boy, this person she had made, with her long face and Gendry's blue eyes. She'd not even known he existed those months ago when she sailed away, and now it almost seems she knows nothing else but them. Even Kyra and her own children, and Jon and Tormund under their own sleeping skins, and everyone else out in the world. Her heart aches for some of those people, and yet even the feeling itself feels distant. 

Until she falls asleep, her beautiful new Ned cradled upon her chest, and suddenly she's Nymeria again, and she's found her way into a castle somewhere. It's not Winterfell, but even with Arya's mind present, too, Nymeria doesn't seem confused, or unsure of her steps. 

She catches Davos' familiar silhouette in a corridor, and Arya's own breath jerks, enough that Jon is roused by it, coming over to her and waking her moments later when it jerks again, but not so soon that she misses the voice she heard earlier, though surely different words, and Gendry's after them. The conversation is heavy with the fury of his father's words, but she feels his hand upon Nymeria's head, large and warm and gentle.

"My lord, it is not wise of you to keep this creature here any longer. This beast and its demeanor will surely bar you from finding a bride, if it hasn't already."

Arya can't help a growl, a deep, ugly thing that rises within her without even a thought, and she sees that this man is the maester as she coaxes Nymeria into following Gendry's eyes towards him.

"So be it," Gendry says, the statement easy off his tongue, and she wakes back North full of warmth, Jon's anxious expression before her, meeting her own, his hand stroking back her hair. 

"A nightmare?" 

"Nymeria," she answers, wistful, and pulls her sleeping babe the littlest bit tighter against her chest. Jon doesn't voice any further questions, but she answers those, too.

"When I can travel again, I need to go to Storm's End."


End file.
